This course, taught as a lower-level seminar, will address the role the media has played in creating images and understandings of 'Blackness' in the United States, particularly where it converges with popular ideologies about gender.

This course examines women's religious activities, traditions and spirituality in a number of different African contexts. Drawing on ethnographic, historical, literary, and religious studies scholarship, we will explore a variety of themes and debates that have emerged in the study of gender and religion in Africa. Topics will include gendered images of sacred power; the construction of gender through ritual; sexuality and fertility; and women

Reading, class discussion, and research on a special topic in African-American and African Studies culminatiing in the composition of a research paper. Topics change from term to term, and vary with the instructor. Primarily for fourth-year students but open to others.

Studies how differences in pronunciation, vocabulary choice, non-verbal communication, and/or communicative style serve as social markers of gender identity and differentiation in Western and non-Western cultures. Includes critical analysis of theory and methodology of social science research on gender and language.

This course offers an introduction to recent anthropological scholarship on romance to examine how intimate relationships shape human experiences. Through readings and films, we investigate the increasingly popular idealization of "companionate marriages," in which spouses are ideally linked by affection. Our examples include queer and straight experiences, and a diversity of racial, cultural, classed, and gendered representations.

In this course, we will examine the themes of love, war, and diaspora in the literature of the Lebanese writer, Hoda Barakat. Some of the topics that will interest us are: the role of the author as a witness to the Lebanese civil war, the challenges of rewriting history, recreating the homeland's image in diasporic locales, collective and individual memories and its role in trauma recall and testimony.

This course explores the question of whether there might be something called a 'feminist aesthetics.' We look at the work of a handful of women photographers, and read criticism about photography, to leverage our exploration into feminist aesthetics. The course works within the frame of feminist discourse. It presents the work of a small number of photographers whose work we will interpret in conjunction with readings in criticism and theory.

A comprehensive overview of contemporary Arab women's literature, this course examines all Arab women's literary genres starting from personal letters, memoirs, speeches, poetry, fiction, drama, to journalistic articles and interviews. Selected texts cover various geographic locales and theoretical perspectives. Special emphasis will be given to the issues of Arab female authorship, subjectivity theory, and to the question of Arab Feminism.

This seminar focuses on works of fiction from modern China that articulate womanhood from a variety of perspectives. In addition to women writers (Qiu Jin, Ding Ling, Eileen Chang, Xi Xi, Chen Ran, Zhu Tianxin), male writers such as Xu Dishan, Mao Dun, and Lao She who devote unusual attention to feminine subjectivity are also included. Familiarity with Chinese culture and society and literary analysis are preferred, but not required.

This seminar focuses on works of fiction from modern China that articulate womanhood from a variety of perspectives. In addition to women writers (Qiu Jin, Ding Ling, Eileen Chang, Xi Xi, Chen Ran, Zhu Tianxin), male writers such as Xu Dishan, Mao Dun, and Lao She who devote unusual attention to feminine subjectivity are also included. Familiarity with Chinese culture and society and literary analysis are preferred, but not required. Students enrolled in the 5000 level course will be required to use some Chinese language materials.

This course focuses on women's roles and lives in Ancient Greece and Rome. Students are introduced to the primary material (textual and material) on women in antiquity and to current debates about it. Subjects addressed will include sexual stereotypes and ideals, power-relations of gender, familial roles, social and economic status, social and political history, visual art, medical theory, and religion. For more details on this class, please visit the department website at http://www.virginia.edu/classics/.

This course provides an opportunity for students to develop their leadership skills through involvement in academic service learning. Students will explore the psychological, social, and cultural issues affecting adolescent girls and apply this understanding through service with the Young Women Leaders Program (YWLP), a mentoring program that pairs middle school girls with college women for a year. Offered on the Undergraduate and Graduate levels. Graduate level requires additional readings and assignments.

This course provides an opportunity for students to develop their leadership skills through involvement in academic service learning. Students will explore the psychological, social, and cultural issues affecting adolescent girls and apply this understanding through service with the Young Women Leaders Program (YWLP), a mentoring program that pairs middle school girls with college women for a year. Offered on the Undergraduate and Graduate levels. Graduate level requires additional readings and assignments.

Cross-cultural readings in women's childhood narratives. Emphasis on formal as well as thematic aspects. For more details on this class, please visit the department website at: http://www.virginia.edu/german/Undergraduate/Courses.

The seminar will examine the historical scholarship, literary fiction, and primary source materials relating to the infamous Salem witch trials of 1692 and enable students to work with all the original sources. Prerequisites: Restricted to Religious Studies, American Studies, English, SWAG, and History Majors.

This is an introductory course to Japanese literary traditions from the late 19th century to the present. By reading a broad range of writings including political accounts, fictional narratives and poetic prose, the course examines how a variety of writing practices contributed to the production of modern Japanese literature. No knowledge of Japanese is required.

This seminar will take up the world's earliest instance of literature written extensively by, for, and about women, including such famous works as the Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon and Sarashina Diary, among others. The focus will be on reading gender as a fictional enactment of desire and identity that is performed through acts of writing and reading. No prior knowledge of Japanese language or literature is required.

This is an introductory course to Japanese literary traditions from the late 19th century to the present. By reading a broad range of writings including political accounts, fictional narratives and poetic prose, the course examines how a variety of writing practices contributed to the production of modern Japanese literature. No knowledge of Japanese is required.

This seminar will take up the world's earliest instance of literature written extensively by, for, and about women, including such famous works as the Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon and Sarashina Diary, among others. The focus will be on reading gender as a fictional enactment of desire and identity that is performed through acts of writing and reading. No prior knowledge of Japanese language or literature is required.

The focus of this class will be on viewings and analyses of films featuring images of teens produced between 1930 and the present, focusing on the following questions: what is adolescence (and how has it been defined in American film)? What is the range of experience that characterizes American adolescence across gender, race, and class lines? How does it make sense to think about the social influence of films on individuals and society?

This course will explore the complex cultural dynamics of LGBTQ media visibility, along with its social, political, and psychological implications for LGBTQ audiences. It explores four domains: (1) the question of LGBT media visibility (2) the complex processes of inclusion, normalization, and assimilation in popular culture (3) media industries and the LGBT market (4) the relationship between digital media, LGBT audiences, and everyday life.

This class will examine the normative basis of the public sphere and critiques of its current structure and ask: What would a more inclusive vision of political participation and communication look like? In attempting to build an answer, we will examine a number of works on communication ethics, politics and media, with an emphasis on feminist and queer scholarship.

As one of the primary cultural drivers of common sense, shared values, and political ideology, media are certainly influential storytellers. This course creates space for considering media's role in articulating and fashioning the limits and possibilities of gender identity. We will pay particular attention to representations of gender non-conformity in popular culture such as female masculinity, male femininity, and transgender subjectivity.

This course will examine the ways in which different mass media help to define our cultural ideas about gender differences and the ways in which feminist scholars have responded to these definitions by criticizing existing media images and by creating some alternatives of their own. The course will examine the notion that the mass media might influence our development as gendered individuals and consider different forms of feminist theory.

Women in the Middle East and South Asia have embraced social media as a tool for expressing their identities and promoting causes important to them. This course examines women's use of social media in five selected countries -Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, India, and Pakistan - and investigates how it simultaneously enables and limits women's empowerment.

This seminar examines life narratives and other forms of literary output by Iranian women writers. We will examine the ways these writers have desegregated a predominantly all-male literary tradition, as well as their arrival at the forefront of a bloodless social movement. Some of the genres to be investigated include novels, short stories, poetry, autobiographies, memoirs, and films.

This seminar examines life narratives and other forms of literary output by Iranian women writers. We will examine the ways these writers have desegregated a predominantly all-male literary tradition, as well as their arrival at the forefront of a bloodless social movement. Some of the genres to be investigated include novels, short stories, poetry, autobiographies, memoirs, and films.

The focus of the course will be the exploration of various moral, legal and policy issues posed by efforts to curtail or enhance fertility through contraception, abortion, and recent advances in reproductive technology. For more details on this class, please visit the department website at http://www.virginia.edu/philosophy/. Prerequisite: One prior course in ethics from any department.

Focuses on the state and how power is gendered in the developing world. Topics include feminist methods and concepts, women in the military, nationalism, women's movements, quotas, citizenship and globalization. Cross-listed with SWAG 3350.

Investigates the ways social structures and institutions shape gender in sub-Saharan Africa, with an emphasis on the state. Topics include gender in the pre-colonial and colonial era, contemporary African women's movements, women in politics, development, HIV/AIDS and sexuality.

Overview of research and theory related to sexual orientation across the lifespan from the standpoint of the social sciences. Topics include conceptualization of sexual identities, origins and development of sexual orientation, sexual identity formation and disclosure. Selected issues such as couple relationships, employment and careers, parenthood, and aging are also explored, since they may be affected by sexual orientation. Prerequisite: Third- or fourth-year psychology major

This course examines women's religious activities, traditions and spirituality in a number of different African contexts. Drawing on ethnographic, historical, literary, and religious studies scholarship, we will explore a variety of themes and debates that have emerged in the study of gender and religion in Africa. Topics will include gendered images of sacred power; the construction of gender through ritual; sexuality and fertility; and women.

This seminar takes as its point of departure Carolyn Bynum's statements: "No scholar studying religion, no participant in ritual, is ever neuter. Religious experience is the experience of men and women, and in no known society is this experience the same." The unifying theme is gender and Buddhism, exploring historical, textual and social questions relevant to the status of women and men in the Buddhist world from its origins to the present day.

A theological overview of Jewish and Christian reflection on proper sexual conduct in the United States, with specific emphasis on pre-marital sex, adoption, abortion, gay marriage, and the teaching of sex education in public schools.

What does it mean to construct one's identity in dialogue with ancient texts and traditions? Can the gap between ancient and contemporary be bridged? Or must texts and traditions born of a remote time and place remain hopelessly irrelevant to contemporary life? This course explores these questions by examining the myriad ways that contemporary Jews balance the complexities of modern life with the demands of an ancient heritage.

We will read and critique the fiction and poetry of culturally specific regions while reflecting on the assumption that experiences and identities are fundamentally gendered. We will explore issues associated with women writing in regional languages to writing in mainstream languages like Hindi, Urdu and English. We will also examine how the publication and dissemination of women's texts are related to the women movements in India and Pakistan. Prerequisite: Completion of First Writing Requirement

Open to students with no knowledge of Russian. Studies the rituals of birth, marriage, and death as practiced in 19th-century peasant Russia and in Russia today and the oral literature associated with these rituals. Topics include family patterns, child socialization and child rearing practices, gender issues, and problems of the elderly in their 19th century and current manifestations.

Feminist Theory offers a focused exploration of ways that late 20th Century and early 21st Century feminist theorists challenge, alter and deploy central concerns and paradigms of Western cultural assumption. Although Feminist Theory as a category incorporates interdisciplinary and global perspectives, the slant of this course is a focus on Western culture and Feminist Social Theory.

The focus of this class will be on viewings and analyses of films featuring images of teens produced between 1930 and the present, focusing on the following questions: what is adolescence (and how has it been defined in American film)? What is the range of experience that characterizes American adolescence across gender, race, and class lines? How does it make sense to think about the social influence of films on individuals and society?

The global Islamic revival is often considered an obstacle to gender equality. So how are we to understand women's involvement in Islamic movements? And what can these phenomena tell us about gender and modernity? This class will read ethnographic accounts of Muslim women in various parts of the world. We will discuss these ethnographies with an eye for how they speak to and challenge sociological theories of gender, identity, and globalization. Prerequisites: Student must have taken at least one course on gender, or instructor permission.

This course will examine the ways in which different mass media help to define our cultural ideas about gender differences and the ways in which feminist scholars have responded to these definitions by criticizing existing media images and by creating some alternatives of their own. The course will examine the notion that the mass media might influence our development as gendered individuals and consider different forms of feminist theory.
Prerequisite: six credits of Sociology or permission of instructor

Examines gender stratification - the relative level of equality of men and women in a given group - in comparative and cross-historical perspective. Several theories are presented to explain the variations, from gender-egalitarian to highly patriarchal groups. Prerequisite: Six credits of Sociology or instructor permission.

This course will explore the social construction and consequences of gender, covering such topics as work, care, sexuality, identity, politics and inequality. Readings will include the classics as well as newer works in the field. Prerequisite: Graduate status; six credits in sociology or permission from the instructor.

Study of major Latin American women writers from 1900 to the present, including poets, essayists, playwrights, and fiction writers. Discussion will focus on the literary representation of issues related to gender and culture. Prerequisite: SPAN 3010, 3300, and 3 credits of 3400-3430, or departmental placement.

Examines writings by women authors of Spain and Latin America, using the texts as a basis for studying the evolving roles and paradigms of women in these societies. Prerequisite: SPAN 3010, 3300, and 3 credits of 3400-3430, or departmental placement

In this course we will read extensively from the poetry of the three most famous women poets of Latin America in the twentieth century: Uruguay's Delmira Agustini, Argentina's Alfonsina Storni, and Chile's Gabriela Mistral, the first Latin American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Prerequisite: SPAN 3010, 3300, and 3 credits of 3400-3430, or departmental placement

An introduction to gender studies, including the fields of women's studies, feminist studies, LGBT studies, & masculinity studies. Students will examine historical movements, theoretical issues, & contemporary debates, especially as they pertain to issues of inequality & to the intersection of gender with race, class, sexuality, & nationalism. Topics will vary according to the interdisciplinary expertise & research focus of the instructor.

This course is an interdisciplinary introduction to LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) Studies. We will study historical events and political, literary, and artistic figures and works; contemporary social and political issues; the meaning and development of sexual and gender identities; and different disciplinary definitions of meaning and knowledge.

WGS 2224

Black Femininities and Masculinities in Media (3.00)

Addresses the role the media has played in creating images and understandings of "Blackness" in the United States, particularly where it converges with popular ideologies about gender.

Examines the roles of deaf women inside and outside of the signing Deaf community. Using an interdisciplinary approach, considers such topics as language and cultural barriers, violence against women, sexuality, race, class, education, and work. Investigates disparities between deaf and hearing women and the choices available to d/Deaf women, individually and collectively, in contemporary culture.

This course takes an interdisciplinary approach to exploring ways that gender and sexuality impact death and dying. Aries' The Hour of Our Death and Seremetakis' The Last Word will be brought into conversation with Malson and Ussher's work on anorexia and Crimp's and Owen's theorizing representations of AIDS. We will explore photography's role in "capturing" the image of death, from 19th c. spirit photographs to 20th c. documentaries.

WGS 2450

Gender and Environmental Justice (3.00)

Examines different ways of integrating gender into environmental analysis and organizing around the world, with a focus on power and links to race/class/nation. Topics include women's leadership in environmental movements; ecofeminism vs. feminist environmentalism; gendering of ecological knowledge and restoration; the impact of gendered divisions of labor on ecology; environmental violence; unequal health impacts; intimacy and sustainability.

This course will focus on issues in technology and reproduction from historical and cross-cultural perspectives. We will examine critical perspectives on science, power, gender, and inequality as they influence cultural constructions of reproductive processes such as pregnancy, childbirth, infertility, and debates about the enhancement and limitation of human fertility. Prerequisite: Course in WGS, ANTH, Bioethics preferred

Students will explore the psychological, social, and cultural issues affecting adolescent girls and apply this understanding through service with the Young Women Leaders Program (YWLP). As we delve into theory and research on adolescent development, effective mentoring practices, and leadership development, students will test their theoretical knowledge and its application by serving as a Big Sister to an area middle school girl. Prerequisite: Permission of Instructor

This seminar is designed to support the YWLP (Young Women Leaders Program) group facilitators as leaders of YWLP mentoring groups. The content of instruction and discussion will focus on facilitation skills, small group development, and other topics relating to group dynamics, with particular attention to issues related to promoting leadership among adolescent girls and college women. There is an emphasis placed on multicultural issues.

Front Lines of Social Change: Through the Lens of Gender, Race and Class (4.00)

This course is for students who have committed to an internship with the Women's Center. While analyzing the intersectionality of race, class and gender and the deep connection to advocating for social change, interns will be exposed to experiential learning on Grounds in the community and abroad. We see our interns as ambassadors for the university. This course was designed to help students develop into the most well-informed interns possible.

Front Lines of Social Change Part II: Social Justice in Our Community (2.00)

The course is designed to increase students insight into social problems. The course is divided into two parts. The first half of the semester we will focus in class on four problem areas that have a local and/or global focus: sex trafficking, gender and immigrant status, minority women and mental health, and transgender oppression. The second half of the semester will consist of an externship to local organizations.

Introduction to dynamics of gender-based violence, the political and cultural structures that perpetuate it, and avenues for achieving social justice. Students will think critically about the (largely) domestic impact of this violence, and develop a practical understanding of how it intersects with other forms of oppression, by applying theory to real-world problems through experiential learning projects in the community and at the University.

This course is open to undergraduate students who wish to reduce gender-based violence through peer education and engagement. This course will introduce students to various theories on the causes of gender-based violence as well as evidence-based intervention strategies, including public health approaches to violence prevention, and effective program planning.

This course is an interdisciplinary analysis of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) Studies. We will study historical events and political, literary and artistic figures and works; contemporary social and political issues; the meaning and development of sexual and gender identities; and different disciplinary definitions of meaning and knowledge.

Course focuses on 20th century history of LGBTQ activism, but will include formation of heterosexual and homosexual identities and historical constructions of sexual practices prior to the 1900s. From 20th c. the course will focus on the Homophile Movement, Gay Liberation, and ACT UP, among other activist movements. Although primary emphasis will be placed on historical activism, contemporary movements regarding LGBTQ-rights will be included.

What is 'work'? Are women seen as 'workers'? Are there women who do not 'work'? What is the history of paid, less paid, and unpaid work? This course focuses on new trends in the relationship between gender, class and work; and will reveal emerging possibilities in knowledge and practice through changes or reversal in the gender order and its impact on work and its relationship with capital.

Border Crossings: Women, Islam and Literature in the Middle East and North Africa (3.00)

A focus on a bloodless, non-violent revolution that is shaking the foundation of the Islamic Middle East and North Africa, a revolution with women writers at the forefront. An examination of the rhetoric and poetics of sex segregation, voice, visibility, and mobility in a spectrum of genres that includes folklore, novel, short story, poetry, biography, autobiography, and essay. Prerequisite: Previous 2000 level course in the humanities or social sciences.

This course traces the history of American female athletes from the late 1800s through the early 21st century. We will use gender as a means of understanding the evolution of the female athlete, and will also trace the manner by which issues of class and race inform sportswomen's journeys over time, particularly with regard to issues of femininity and homophobia.

This course will examine how film has portrayed women's sports and female athletes. We will explore how well the film industry has documented the history of women's sports, issues important to female athletes such as race, sexuality, equality and issues of femininity, and we will look to see how well these productions stack up against films portraying male athletes and men's sports.

This course will examine female athletes from a global perspective, comparing and contrasting their experiences, and placing them in historical perspective. Among the topics considered will be the Olympic Games, Chinese sports schools, the post-apartheid athletic landscape of South Africa, and Iranian women athlete's struggle against clothing restrictions.

In ancient Greece, women risked death if they even attended the Olympic Games. As Pierre de Coubertin looked to revive the games in 1896, he thought women better suited to cheering on the male victors, than to competing themselves. This course will explore women's early participation in the Olympic Games, the pressures upon Olympic sportswomen to be feminine, and the important intersections of race, class, and sexual orientation.

Gender, Race and Sport: A History of African American Sportswomen (3.00)

Explore the intersection of gender and race in sport, specifically examining the African-American female experience in sport. This course will ask students to consider whether sport was (and continues to be) the great equalizer for both African-American sportsmen and sportswomen, and to evaluate their portrayals (or lack thereof) in both the white and black media.

WGS 3306

Sexuality, Gender, Class and Race in the Teen Film (3.00)

The focus of this class will be on viewings and analyses of films featuring images of teens produced between 1930 and the present, focusing on the following questions: what is adolescence (and how has it been defined in American film)? What is the range of experience that characterizes American adolescence across gender, race, and class lines? How does it make sense to think about the social influence of films on individuals and society?

This course places women, feminism, and activism in a transnational perspective, and offers students the opportunity to examine how issues considered critical to the field of gender studies are impacting women's lives globally in contemporary national contexts. We will look closely at how violence, economic marginality, intersections of race and gender, and varied strategies for development are affecting women in specific geographical locations.

This course examines how different countries "do" gender, exploring the political, social and economic construction of sexual difference. Our focus will be on how power is gendered and its effects on women and men in the developing world. We begin with a theoretical discussion of patriarchy, gender and feminist methods. Continuing to draw upon these theoretical debates, the course then investigates a series of issues, including gender and state formation in the Middle East, women's political participation in India and South Africa, feminist and women's movements in Latin America and Uganda, and globalization in South East Asia.

This course will explore the history of feminism in America from the 1910s to the present day. We will examine the various philosophies and strategies of people who have allied themselves with the feminist movement as well as those who have opposed it. We will ask how activists imagined sexual equality and what reforms-political, legal, economic, cultural, or psychological-they proposed.

This course will explore the complex cultural dynamics of LGBTQ media visibility, along with its social, political, and psychological implications for LGBTQ audiences. It explores four domains: (1) the question of LGBT media visibility (2) the complex processes of inclusion, normalization, and assimilation in popular culture (3) media industries and the LGBT market (4) the relationship between digital media, LGBT audiences, and everyday life.

Introduces current multiculturalism and feminist scholarship, prompting students to make connections between ideas from a wide variety of disciplines, such as history, sociology, anthropology, literature, art history, area studies, and more. Students will be required to complete an in-depth research final project for the course.

As a visual art, architecture as an object projects a specific image; as a spatial art it affects individual and group interaction/engagement with the built environment. Through the lenses of gender and race we will examine human relationships to architecture - as designers, patrons, and users in the public and the private realm and across a broad range of temporal and geographic boundaries.

This course centers on the increasing number of women and juvenile girls who are incarcerated in the United States, and the now more than one million women under some form of correctional supervision in America. We will also explore such areas as feminist approaches to women and crime, racialized representations of criminality, and the impact of gender, race, and class on the criminal justice system.

This course will explore the historical experience of young people and the meaning of youth from the colonial period to the late twentieth century. We will analyze how shifting social relations and cultural understandings changed what it meant to grow up. Topics to be explored include work, family, gender, sexuality, education, political involvement, and popular culture.

WGS 3625

Cultures, Spaces, and Worldviews of International Aid (3.00)

The main focus of this class is the culture and values of development practitioners, and how these shape ideas of development itself. It explores the interconnected processes, relationships, and spaces through which development practitioners and planners learn, live , work, and encounter (or not) people who are the targets of development plans and interventions.

This course explores how Italian women writers have represented food in their short stories, novels and autobiographies in dialogue with the culture and society from late nineteenth century to the present. These lectures will offer a close reading of the symbolic meaning of food in narrative and the way it intersects with Italian women's socio-cultural history, addressing issues of gender, identity and politics of the body.

Introduces students to some key & controversial theoretical texts that make up the emerging field of queer theory. The approach will be interdisciplinary, w/ an emphasis on literary, social, & aesthetic criticisms that may shift according the instructor's areas of expertise. Active reading & informed discussion will be emphasized for the often unseen, or submerged, aspects of sexuality embedded in cultural texts, contexts, & litterateurs.

This course provides an overview of the historical bases and contemporary developments in feminist theorizing and analyzes a range of theories on gender, including liberal, Marxist, radical, difference, and postmodernist ideas. We explore how feminist theories apply to contemporary debates on the body, sexuality, colonialism, globalization, transnationalism incorporating analyses of race, class, national difference and cross-cultural perspectives.

This course will explore religious, social, scientific and legal views on gender, sexuality and identity that may extend from medieval through early modern Europe with an emphasis on the French tradition. Readings will include literary texts and cultural documents as well as current scholarship on questions of sexuality, gender, and identity politics

This course focuses on women's autobiographical texts and the diverse ways authors explore issues surrounding identity, power, and resistance in their narratives. We will read compelling accounts of imprisonment, reservation life, political detention, and more, while closely examining women's participation in ongoing struggles for social justice.

As one of the primary cultural drivers of common sense, shared values, and political ideology, media are certainly influential storytellers. This course creates space for considering media's role in articulating and fashioning the limits and possibilities of gender identity. We will pay particular attention to representations of gender non-conformity in popular culture such as female masculinity, male femininity, and transgender subjectivity.

This course will consider the theoretical place of gender in American politics. We will also take up a number of topics, including the unavoidable gender gap, the role of masculinity and femininity in conditioning our perceptions of issues and political candidates, the ways gender, politics, and society have interacted historically, and the ways race and gender (and class) interact in conditioning political behavior. Prerequisite: At least one course either on gender or on political behavior.

This course will examine the ways in which different mass media help to define our cultural ideas about gender differences and the ways in which feminist scholars have responded to these definitions by criticizing existing media images and by creating some alternatives of their own. The course will examine the notion that the mass media might influence our development as gendered individuals and consider different forms of feminist theory.

Examines gender stratification - the relative level of equality of men and women in a given group - in comparative and cross-historical perspective. Several theories are presented to explain the variations, from gender-egalitarian to highly patriarchal groups. (IR) Prerequisites: WGS or SOC course

This seminar places feminist and non-feminist debates about body politics beauty standards, racialization and color politics, transgender movements, body modification, work discipline, commodification, torture, cyborgs, and new corporeal technologies--in the context of a wider universe of political and philosophical writing on embodiment. Students will be introduced to culturally and historically diverse bodies. Prerequisite: 4th year WGS majors, WGS 2nd majors and WGS minors or instructor permission

This course examines the historical and continuing role of LGBTQ communities in U.S. society. Topics covered will include changes that have taken place over time, LGBTQ-rights as a social movement, and homelessness as an LGBTQ-rights issue. Particular emphasis will be placed on power relations in LGBTQ communities, including the role of racism, classism, and sexism.

The course integrates mindfulness training with interpretation of art, literature, and writing. Course material is global in scope, incorporating diverse works from Urdu poetry to Japanese haikus, including texts and mindfulness exercises from Tibet. Students will practice mindfulness to enhance their understanding of writers' and artists' personal, historical, cultural, and gender perspectives.

Course will investigate marriage as represented on the early modern European stage. Italian, Spanish, French and English plays comprise our subject matter. We'll consider the legal, social, and cultural history of matrimony to background our study of the stageworks; we will analyze scripts and performances to learn how dramatic and theatrical convention intersected w/ marital institution and negotiations, onstage and off. Taught in English.

Typically, men are dealt with in a way that casually presents them as representative of humanity. This course addresses the various ways that men are also 'gendered,' and can be the subject of inquiries of gender, sexuality, inequality, and privilege in their own right. Prerequisite: Students need to have completed a WGS course.

This course will allow students to explore the new scholarship on black girlhood. Scholars working on the history of black girls in the US, Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa have created a vibrant new field of black girl studies. Combining insights from black feminism and the history of childhood, these scholars have centered black girls' experience as a means of reframing our understanding of citizenship, labor, and creativity.

This course begins by investigating how scholars from a wide array of disciplines define gender-based violence (GBV), its prevalence, causes, and consequences. Next, we focus on several areas where gender -based violence is pervasive, such as universities, poor neighborhoods, during war, and in the global economy. The final section of the course examines responses to GBV by health care providers, feminists, and governments. Prerequisite: 3rd or 4th year student

Majors in Women, Gender and Sexuality (WGS) are encouraged to become Distinguished Majors. Students complete a two-semester written thesis (approximately 40-60 pages in length) in their fourth year under the supervision of a WGS faculty member. The thesis allows students to pursue their own interests in depth and have the intellectual satisfaction of defining and completing a sustained project. Please see your WGS advisor for more information. Prerequisites: WGS Major, WGS 2nd Major

Majors in Women, Gender and Sexuality (WGS) are encouraged to become Distinguished Majors. Students complete a two-semester written thesis (approximately 40-60 pages in length) in their fourth year under the supervision of a WGS faculty member. The thesis allows students to pursue their own interests in depth and have the intellectual satisfaction of defining and completing a sustained project. Please see your WGS advisor for more information. Prerequisite: WGS Major, 2nd Major

A focus on a bloodless, non-violent revolution that is shaking the foundation of the Islamic Middle East and North Africa, a revolution with women writers at the forefront. An examination of the rhetoric and poetics of sex segregation, voice, visibility, and mobility in a spectrum of genres that includes folklore, novel, short story, poetry, biography, autobiography, and essay. This course section is for graduate students only. Prerequisites: Instructor Consent Required

An introduction to contemporary feminist and queer theories, intended for graduate students. Offers a survey of contemporary feminist and queer epistemology, subject formation, ethics, and politics, as well as a grounding in the methods of feminist and queer theory. What is a woman? What is sex? What is gender? What is sexuality? These and related questions are discussed from multidisciplinary perspectives.